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Saturday, January 3, 2009

The Brit baller dusted off an impressive 3-day spin in Abu Dhabi, dominating James Blake, squeaking out a third straight win over a smartingRoger Federer and, today, defeating top baller Rafael Nadal 6-4, 5-7, 6-3 to win the inaugural Capitala World Championship and $250K to boot.

After getting a daily look at his off-season training intensive in Miami, we all knew Andy was serious about making his move and he def looks like the one to beat, exo or not.

Rafa was pretty clearly using the match to experiment with sots, his serve, net play etc (much like Fed did), whereas Murray played like it was a grand slam final. The fact that neither Fed nor rafa were playing at their peak, and the matched were still close, can't be overlooked either...

i saw the match last night, even though it's just an exhibtion and a $200,000 or morew at stake, the players really gave their best.....

it went to near 3-hours, at 2:30 something, and the match was intense, some thought that murray could end it at the second set, yet, nadal changed fortunes when he broke at 3-3 to go ahead for 4-3, and then he took the second set

the third set was something about who's gonna step on the driver seat and take charge of the ball, both were nice and played their best to level at 3-3, but the next game, the seventh game decided it all, if andy breaks nadal's serve there is a possibility that andy could steamroll rafa and take the match, if nadal could hold on to his serve then he has the chance for the match ...

the seventh game provided much entertainment, it became a lkonger game, yet, the near of that game both had shown exhaustion, nadal was breathing hard, i couldn't believe it, and andy is breathing hard too

one thing i found that, was andy was like novak in flexibility and andy is like rafa's speed, andy pretty much can chase every ball rafa is giving into him, and rafa has now used more of the drop shots than andy, in contrast andy used rarely of it last night....

andy will really be a good contender for the aussie open, much more if he defeats rafa and fed back-to-back again,

and for rafa, rafa's shots actually lacks depth yesterday, it is maybe because the surface is hard, and not clay where his shots are more penetrating, though it still remains that his shots has the angles of it, rafa is using much his forehand nowadays, and it's not easy to guess where his forehand will land, very good lefty-user....

Congrats to Andy, eventhough he was the only one in the tournament wanting to win it to prove his challange to number one, I assume. The others were completly fixed on trying things out, doing some fitness and not getting injured as main agenda. I believe Andy has a really good shot at AO, just hope his isnt firing up all his ammo too early. I would wish the Brits the Wimbledon title at last from him, but that is so faaaaar to go